New season feels like I am playing COD. Ruined a good thing.

That's been almost exactly my experience as well. I used to carefully curate a 10% win rate and a respectable k/d. Then the changes, including the quit=death that you mentioned, conspired to stop me from caring about any of that. It got to the point where I would join matches just to see how bad the matchmaking would actually be. Not to play. Not to engage. Not even to practice my "solo to second" map runs. Just to see what the matchmaker would do and whether or not I would get squadmates who hadn't given up yet. Strangely, they still almost never seem to give up. They don't know what to do, how to play, or apparently how stacked against them everything is. They just keep moving forward. I can't understand it.

Well, if that's not the confession of the most jaded player in the game then I can't imagine what else it might sound like. How I wish some other, better game would come along. I guess that's just too high of a bar.

100% agreed. I know they like to claim they listen to "the community," but what they don't say out loud is that as far as they're concerned "the community" is the people with the biggest streams and the people they meet at tournaments. I don't have a stream. Do you? I've never made the ALGS cut. Have you? Has any normal person? Yet here I am almost every single day, plodding away at this game, as I've done since it launched. Through every up and the spectacular array of downs, downs which seem to be getting bigger and more frequent with each passing season. And I'm full of opinions, Respawn. Ask me anything. I'll give you an earful.

I don't know where you've been the last 18 months, but even during the season where Ballistic was Introduced I'd get killed by a R99 in 0.5s from 175m away. It's nothing new.
Only thing I've noticed is I occasionally do more damage and get more kills, but my time to die is still the same.

My KDR has always been 0.24, now it's gone to 0.3. I see this season as an upgrade.

Plus the improvements to anti cheat seem to have eradicated most cheaters. I rarely have to report anymore.

Among the replies I see some bogus comments. Example: "The amount of third parties is an absolute disgrace this season. Apex is more unplayable than it's ever been and that's saying something." I see the opposite. This season is the most playable since Catalyst was introduced.

I've only been playing since the last week of Season of the Hunted, but I do have to say the thing that hurt me most was when they nuked revenant. Removed his Silence and Death Totem. My KDR was over 0.4 with that kit, without him I couldn't do over 0.28. His "pounce" is not a pounce, but a leap. If it were a pounce it would target and do damage.

And the cheat fest that has gone on since at least Ballistic's season, has now been almost eradicated. I wonder how long that will last though... I can actually have fair fights now. It feels the most balanced it has ever been.

You rarely have to report cheaters because they are not sitting on KD 0.24 and playing with you. No offense, of course. Break through or enter an account with KD 1.5 and above and you will understand what the problem is.